Long Stretches

This year has been full of some long stretches; difficult pathways that would lead to very different endings. My mother has suffered excruciating disintegration of her spine. I went to help her with convalescing; a long drive by car of over 900 miles each way. Ten and twelve hours driving two days in a row is a new experience for me. I can report that mom is doing great, and feeling better than she has in 20 years.

The other long stretch is the final journey by our long-time friend, Jim, to his death on September 9th. He was noticeably declining for almost a year. As he lost more freedom, more friends found him and surrounded him with care in his last months. The meeting of these different groups of people has formed a harvest of some amazing new friends.

I was fortunate, along the roads through TX, OK, KA, NE, WY, CO to be blessed with wonderful fields shouting God's glory even when I could not. I felt a little lost at times; both physically and spiritually.I was inadequate in both journeys,(my friend and my mother), but believe that God gave me grace in words, actions, and courage to keep on the lighted path. When I was lost He would find me. The prizes, after tough races, are especially beautiful. Furrows in fields may mimic added furrows in my face, along with some gifts of understanding, maturity, and humility that have stretched my heart.

These fields along the way to and from my mother, spoke of harvest, sowing and reaping, planting seeds, and most of all the generosity of our God. Even in death there is life. As the seed falls to the ground, giving up its essence, there is new birth and new life to come in the next season.

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Show me Your ways, O Lord; teach me Your paths.
Ps. 25:4